Why your life seems ordinary

One of the biggest traps we fall in to is measuring ourselves by what other people do and think. It’s so hard not to do.

Social media is constantly flaunting the best of other people’s lives while taunting us with temptation to do the same. Of course, it’s not a bad thing to share your life with others. But when we constantly share it in a way that is immediately measured by what other people think (comments, likes, shares, RTs, etc.) we begin to value everything we have and do in terms of what other people think about them.

It’s too easy to end up mis-using the blessings in our lives as a means to impress others. Or a tool to communicate our success to outsiders. Or a means of getting attention, earning respect, being affirmed, or a cause for praise that fluffs our self-esteem and quiets our insecurities.

We end up valuing everything in our life based upon what it means to others — rather than what it means to us. Whether they will like it vs. whether we like it. Whether it’s meaningful to others vs. whether it’s meaningful to me. Whether others think it’s right vs. whether God does.

Let’s be honest, from the outside looking in, my life looks pretty ordinary. My car, my house, my job, my front door, my computer, my clothes, my friends and family. The average onlooker wouldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. So if I judge my life by the perspective of outsiders looking in, I will feel pretty ordinary.

What a tragedy to trade reality for such a dull perspective! But when you constantly worry about how outsiders see your life, you’ll end up struggling just not to feel ordinary.

Rather, look anew at your seemingly ordinary life. Instead, think less of what others think, and see the gifts you’ve been given from the perspective of what they mean to *you*. Every single ordinary looking thing in your life is there to aid you on a very specific and important mission. A mission to serve an important purpose that nobody else on the planet can serve except for you. They are not ordinary…for you.

Never stop marveling at how you got them. Be thankful for them. Recognize how special they are.

Then all of a sudden your front door doesn’t seem so ordinary, no matter how ordinarily it’s been made. For through that ordinary looking door passes daily the precious souls of the ones you love. It provides shelter to the same. It marks the boundary of a warm, safe place called home. Not just any home, but *your* home. The home you’re building. There’s nothing ordinary about that door…to you.

Then all of a sudden your plain, old boring car that looks like a million other cars out there doesn’t seem so ordinary any more. For it carries you and your family to your daily destinies. Through its ordinary windows are seen the extraordinary fields and trees and lights and beauty of a world that lines our roads.

That ordinary dinner that you make all the time, the one that tastes like what anyone might get at any other dinner table, is not so ordinary any more. For specifically by it, and by no other meal, the ones you love get the energy they need to move and grow. And specifically by that very meal you come together to pray, to be thankful, to love and share with one another. That is no ordinary meal…to you.

Your life may seem ordinary to other people, that’s fine. But don’t let it be ordinary…to you.